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Pho­to Cred­it- Elyza Rodriguez

My Bio

Pho­to Cred­it- Elyza Rodriguez https://www.toseaornottosee.com

I think I was born with a book in my hand!

From as far back as I can remem­ber, read­ing books has played an impor­tant role in my life. Find­ing a “good” book has always been about the emo­tion jour­ney. One of the first books I remem­ber read­ing as a child was The Vel­veteen Rab­bit.  The idea of being made Real stuck with me. A jour­ney through life is not sup­posed to be eas­i­ly; it is sup­posed to be full of highs and lows, laugh­ter and tears, and suc­cess­es and fail­ures. When a book has those things, one expe­ri­ences life full-throt­tle along­side the char­ac­ters in the story.

Quote from The Vel­veteen Rab­bit (Goodreads,com)

‘It does­n’t hap­pen all at once,’ said the Skin Horse. ‘You become. It takes a long time. That’s why it does­n’t hap­pen often to peo­ple who break eas­i­ly, or have sharp edges, or who have to be care­ful­ly kept. Gen­er­al­ly, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get loose in the joints and very shab­by. But these things don’t mat­ter at all, because once you are Real you can’t be ugly, except to peo­ple who don’t understand.”
― Margery Williams, The Vel­veteen Rabbit

Reading is my life!

As I was grow­ing up, my sum­mers were spent at the pub­lic library, alter­nat­ing between clas­sics books, like Jane Eyre (my absolute favorite!), and “the oth­ers.” Typ­i­cal­ly, those books fell into one of three cat­e­gories: biogra­phies, how to books (usu­al­ly art-relat­ed), and Steven King. *I actu­al­ly cred­it him with my fear of… well, basi­cal­ly every­thing (clowns, cats, teeth, small desert towns, air­planes, the dark, etc.).

One of the perks of being an ele­men­tary school teacher was the books. I could share my love of read­ing with future book lovers—if I had any­thing to say about it. 😉 A pas­sion for books starts when a seed is plant­ed as kids lis­ten to par­ents and teach­ers read well-loved sto­ries over and over; it is nur­tured by inter­ac­tion with qual­i­ty read­ing materials.

Now, I am by no means a book snob. Maybe a long time ago… For me, if a book makes you feel some­thing, care for some­one oth­er than your­self, if you learn some­thing new, or are changed because that book has come into your life, then it is a good book.

Intro the Dystopian novel!

When I became a high school read­ing teacher, I read almost exclu­sive­ly books that would hook the stu­dents in my class­es. I loved YA nov­els because of the emo­tion, adven­ture, rela­tion­ships, and ideas about how the world might look if the future care­tak­ers of the world chose not to get involved. Some of my favorite YA nov­els are The Giv­er, Unwind, I am Num­ber Four, The Hunger Games, Diver­gent, An Abun­dance of Kather­ines, and Eleanor and Park. Hon­est­ly, I could spend the day list­ing books I love, in many dif­fer­ent genres.

The point is, in any genre, you will find great books—and not so great books.

Just like the Vel­veteen Rab­bit, I am on my way to becom­ing. Writ­ing is one of the expe­ri­ences I need­ed to have. As an avid read­er, I know which qual­i­ties com­prise books I love read­ing. So, I chal­lenged myself to write the book I want­ed to read.

I began my jour­ney as a writer of YA dystopi­an fic­tion at the start of this year. Get­ting the first thou­sand words on paper was the tough­est. When I hit five thou­sand words, I was speech­less. Now, I have passed the forty-five thou­sand mark and the end is in sight.

The best part is that I love my book, and my char­ac­ters, and their flaws.

The jour­ney is what makes you Real. 

I’d love to hear from you! When have you tried some­thing that made you feel Real? How did it work out?

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